


Confetti at Midnight

by lady_needless_litany



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Don't copy to another site, M/M, Mild Language, One Shot, POV Tony Stark, Post-Avengers (2012)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-19 23:27:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17011197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady_needless_litany/pseuds/lady_needless_litany
Summary: New Year's Eve finds Tony far more alone and sober than he'd like. Happily, luck is on his side and an old friend is there for him.





	Confetti at Midnight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [WingMoon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WingMoon/gifts).



> Written for the Marvel Holiday Swap 2018.
> 
> To WingMoon, my recipient: I hope you like this! There are parts that strike me as slightly awkward (in terms of writing), but I hope that doesn't impede your enjoyment too much.

Tony stumbled as someone crashed into him, spilling his drink. As the ever-attentive waitstaff hurried to clean it, the young man he’d collided with apologised profusely. He seemed vaguely familiar; perhaps he was one of those Youtubers that everyone was talking about these days. Whoever he was, Tony waved him away with a smiling reassurance and resumed his position, leaning against a metal column.

Most of the room was exposed, airbrushed metal — the club was new and à-la-mode, and offered stunning views of the New York skyline. Despite his immense wealth, the thought of the cost of renting the entire place on New Year’s Eve made Tony cringe.

He’d been there for just over an hour and was already beginning to feel the boredom set in. It was all a little… lacklustre. His mind kept wandering to the lab and his experiments. To sleep, even. _Damn,_ he thought, _must be getting old_.

Internally, he snorted at himself. _Get over it. If you’re not happy, do something about it_.

He noticed, quite abruptly, how stifled the air was. The room was filled to the brim and more people were still flowing through the door. With a sigh and a realisation that this was no longer his scene, he wrote the whole event off, there and then.

He fired a quick text to his driver — a temp, not Happy, who was off celebrating with his family — telling him to go home. The driver replied with a slightly passive-aggressive ‘sure’, which Tony could understand. He sent back a reassurance that he’d pay the guy for the entire night and instantly received a much happier response.

Which meant that Tony was alone, sans transport, and sober at ten-thirty on New Year’s Eve, which was really rather depressing.

He made his way through the throng, giving the dancefloor a wide berth. His mother had raised him with more manners than his father had liked; he wanted to get out of there as soon as he could, but he needed to locate his host first. His host was a supermodel, in her mid-twenties. They’d met at some charity function and formed a surprising bond over anti-war advocacy. Genuinely, they got along well and now regularly invited each other to various social events. A couple of tabloids had tried to stir up rumours about them, but thankfully they’d never taken root.

After several minutes of searching, he found her in a booth, pressed up against one of Hollywood’s latest starlets, far too occupied to want to talk to him. He stared for a minute, a little aghast — he was no prude, but he also acknowledged the value of walls and locked doors. Well, they were both adults and seemed happy enough, so he left them to it. He’d have someone send over a bouquet and a thank you note instead.

He took a slow lift down to the ground floor. When he walked out onto the street, he found it surprisingly chilly — his breath misted in the air before him. Mindlessly, he let his feet guide him; he turned down the street, walking past restaurants and cafés that were buzzing with people. On a whim, he picked a place that looked marginally less crowded than everywhere else: a coffee shop, cheap-looking, but clean. 

Pulling the door open, he avoided eye-contact as he walked in, going straight to the counter. “A coffee, black,” he said. “Please and thanks.”

The woman behind the counter just nodded. “Sure.”

Thankful — and a tad disappointed, his ego grudgingly admitted — that she hadn’t recognised him, be leant against the counter and sighed. _What am I doing? It’s barely eleven o’clock on New Year’s Eve. And I’m ordering a coffee. In a café. Alone! Is this what getting old feels like?_

He rubbed his forehead.

“Here,” the woman said, a few minutes later. She set down a mug in front of him. “Anything else?”

“That’s it.” He paid in cash, refused the change, and scooped his cup off the counter. “Happy New Year.”

The woman looked almost startled. “You too.”

Tony glance around the café. A number of the tables were occupied, but there were plenty of options left — he picked a booth near the back, where he was less likely to be noticed.

His trousers squeaked against the pleather seats as he slid into the booth. It was a table for four, making his solitude all the more apparent. The feeling of isolation that he usually tried to banish through snark, parties, or punching settled itself around him. He wasn’t sure how long he spent staring blankly into the air, teeth worrying his lip, but by the time he took his first sip of coffee, it was already cold.

He drank it anyway. It was surprisingly decent, even stone cold.

It didn’t take him long to get down to the dregs. He made the last few sips count, savouring each of them, the flavour providing a new background for his thoughts.

But his reverie was interrupted unexpectedly.

“Tony?” asked a voice, sounding incredulous.

He snapped back to the here-and-now. Half a glance was all it took for him to respond, equally incredulous. “ _Rhodey?_ ”

“Hey, man. Mind if I sit?” Rhodey indicated the seat opposite him.

His response was surprisingly coherent and relaxed, if a little dazed. He hadn’t seen Rhodey for almost a year — since before New York. “Yeah, go ahead.”

Tony waited for Rhodey to speak first. He obliged with a flash of a smile. “Should I be concerned that you’re in a café by yourself on New Year’s Eve? It’s not your usual style.”

“No, it’s not.” Tony shrugged. “First time for everything, I guess.”

“Yeah, but the suit and the confetti?”

“Confetti?”

“Yeah-” Rhodey vaguely gestured at Tony’s hair. “There’s a fair bit up there.”

Tony cursed lightly. “Why is there alway confetti?”

He combed his fingers through his hair, dislodging a few bits, but largely failing to remove the glitter. “How have you been, Rhodey?”

“Y’know how it is: nothing interesting, but always busy.”

“Too familiar,” he commented. “Really, nothing interesting? You’ve got a talent for understating things. There’s gotta be something.”

He smiled self-consciously. “There’s always something, I guess. But nothing new.”

“Wish I could say the same thing.” Tony avoided mentioning the nightmares, the sudden flashes. It wasn’t the kind of thing you could drop into casual conversation. “Missed you, of course.” He blew him a kiss across the table.

Raising a knowing eyebrow, Rhodey heaved himself up. “I’m going to get a coffee, so that we can catch up properly.”

“Sure, sure.”

Tony crossed his arms, allowing thoughts to wander again.

The café was emptying as the clock crept closer to midnight, so the wait was short. It was only a few minutes before Rhodey slid back into the booth, this time with a coffee in hand.

Measuredly, he took his first sip. “How’s Pepper?”

“Oh.” Tony glanced away, fiddling with the mug in front of him. He cleared his throat. “I - er - Pepper and I broke up.”

“Really?” Rhodey was genuinely shocked. He’d though Pepper was _the one_ ; her and Tony had balanced each other out perfectly. Not that they’d had an easy time, givenTony’s latest hobby. “How long?”

“’Bout three months, I guess. About a month after the aliens and nukes and shit.” Tony shifted in his seat. “She’s still heading up Stark Industries, of course.”

It was painfully obvious that his bravado was concealing something far less glamorous; whether it was betrayal, resignation, or indignation, he couldn’t tell. He’d never known Tony to get hung up on a breakup — but, then, most of his breakups hadn’t involved someone like Pepper.

Rhodey wasn’t quite sure how to cope with a Tony that was so quiet, so withdrawn, so he resorted to one of the man’s own techniques: he changed the subject.

“Are you planning on staying in this place all night? ’Cause I haven’t eaten since this morning, and this place only does depressed-looking muffins.”

“Hey,” Tony said, struck by an idea. “What are you doing for the rest of the evening?”

“Uh - I’ve not got any plans, actually. Was meant to be going to a friend’s place, but their kid got sick yesterday, so…”

“Great! Well, not great,” Tony corrected himself. “But it means I can monopolise you for the rest of the night without any complaints.”

Rhodey, recalling the cracking hangovers that usually followed a night with Tony, had the sense to look mildly alarmed. He agreed anyway — he’d never been able to say no, especially when he seemed glum. “Sure. Monopolise away.”

It was no exaggeration to say that Tony looked delighted. “Right! First things first, then: food. Can’t have you keeling over before midnight. That wouldn’t be any fun.”

A vaguely strangled sound escaped Rhodey’s throat as he visibly regretted his decision. Tony ploughed straight on anyway — he was thoroughly used to Rhodey’s partial reluctance, which usually ebbed away once he started enjoying himself. Besides, Rhodey was confident enough to put his foot down if Tony went too far; not that that was going to be an issue, because Tony had relatively quiet plans for the rest of the night. He wasn’t a college kid with more time and money than sense — not any more.

They left the café, walking for a few minutes until they came to a takeaway that was bustling with people. “Busy means good, right?”

“Yeah, as long as we don’t get swamped by adoring fans,” Rhodey remarked, referring to the following that the Avengers had acquired since their heroics earlier that year.

“We’re more likely to get lynched, if you ask me,” Tony replied. “Plenty of people don’t like us. Can’t blame them, to be honest.”

Rhodey opened his mouth to respond, but Tony was ahead of him, weaving his way to the front of the queue. Quiet, Rhodey remained in the shop’s doorway, unrecognised and unmolested. Tony, meanwhile, had reaching the cashier and was gesturing wildly as he ordered. He had to pause several times to take selfies with the excitable customers that he’d pushed past — it was fair compensation, he supposed, and at least he didn’t hate the whole affair.

One advantage to Tony being recognised was that the kitchen prioritised his order and they were out the door again far quicker than he’d expected. He shoved a shawarma in Rhodey’s hands and they stepped outside again. They ate as they walked, peacefully.

“So,” Tony mumbled through a mouthful of food. “Where d’you want to go?”

“Look, as long as it’s not a club, I don’t care.”

Fair. Tony resolved to stick to his initial plan. “Okay, I’ll take you home, then.”

“Home?” Rhodey shot him a look of confusion.

“Stark Tower,” he clarified. “Got a bit battered, but it’s mostly fixed up now. It’s got a great view — good for the fireworks.”

Rhodey was halfway through chewing a particularly stubborn mouthful of chicken, so he simply shrugged. “’kay.”

In all honesty, Tony had no idea how to get there - it had been years since he last took a proper walk around the city. The idea of flagging down a taxi, probably the sensible option here, didn’t appeal. So he took a gamble, trusted his instincts.

Navigating in the building’s general direction, Tony attempted to distract Rhodey by interrogating him about his suit. “You stole it,” Tony reminded him when he complained about the questioning, without the venom that the words would have carried in the past. “You brought this on yourself.”

Rhodey sighed. “It wasn’t my call, Stark.”

For the most part, his distraction tactics worked. Rhodey followed Tony without complaint, assuming that he had the situation under control.

Indeed, they arrived safe and sound, if a little later than necessary. Their route hadn’t been the most efficient, but at least they ended up in the right place. And they’d had plenty of time to finish their shawarmas enroute.

Once they’d arrived, they still had forty minutes until midnight. Tony led Rhodey through the doors and across the lobby, straight into Tony’s private lift.

“No security guards,” Rhodey noted.

The lift doors slid closed behind them.

“There’s usually guards here during the day, more to help people than anything else. J.A.R.V.I.S. takes care of everything else,” he explained, not without a hint of pride. “This place is technically the Avengers Tower now, but we’re not open for business yet. Still fixing up the interior of the top floors.”

“Right. Thought it looked different.”

The lift pinged softly as it slowed, notifying them of their arrival. They stopped a few moments later, doors opening to reveal the building’s top floor - currently a complete mess, tarpaulin stretched across some of the windows and several of Tony’s holoprojectors lying on the floor.

“Sorry, bit of a mess, still working,” Tony said hurriedly. “Don’t touch anything. I’ll be back in a second.”

Before Rhodey could ask any questions, he disappeared through a barely-visible door in the wall next to the lift. _Classic Tony._ In his absence, Rhodey cast a critical eye over the place: it was definitely spacious, with a spectacular view across the the city. Where the windows weren’t blocked, all he could see was a sea of flickering electric lights. It was almost hypnotic. Peaceful.

“The idea is that we’ll live and work here eventually,” Tony spoke from behind him. Rhodey had to suppress his instinctive startle. “I already got my wine and liquor cabinets started.”

He brandished a bottle and two champagne flutes as evidence, walking past Rhodey and making his way onto the balcony. Rhodey followed, a couple of steps behind.

Once they were outside, Tony discovered that there was a light breeze, enough to ruffle his hair. Other than that, the night sky seemed clear.

He handed the two glasses to Rhodey, made quick work of the bottle’s cork, and poured them generous helpings of champagne. “Making any resolutions?” he joked.

Rhodey leaned against the railing, and Tony mirrored him, elbow-to-elbow.“Haven’t made resolutions since college. Always failed anyway.”

Tony laughed. “Same, although I keep making them anyway. Don’t seem to learn.”

“What’s your resolution this year, then?”

“Haven’t decided yet.”

They eased into a companionable quiet, each left to their own thoughts. Tony wandered from subject to subject, unable to remember the last time he’d felt so calm. So unquestioningly accepted. Everyone else challenged hin, judged him, constantly. Except Rhodey. He’d always found Rhodey attractive, but that had always stopped him from making a move — he valued Rhodey’s constant friendship too much to throw it away.

As he’d progressed through life, he’d become more and more sure that it could have been possible to have both. But then Pepper had entered his life and Tony had found happiness via a different route. Now he was left to ponder those possibilities again, speculative and fighting an unnatural sense of resignation.

Until a sudden burst of coloured sparks soared into the night sky, bringing Tony back to the present. He turned to the left, where Rhodey was standing. “Must be midnight.”

“Looks like it. Happy New Year, then.”

“Happy New Year,” Tony repeated.

They were so close, faces illuminated by the city’s glow and the fireworks exploding in the sky. Tony had been this close to him before, but now he noticed things he’d never seen before: the sharpness of his eyebrows, the marks on his lips from where he’d worried them.

It was unlike anything he’d ever experienced. In situations like these, he was accustomed to a typhoon-like lust, but he found instead a sense of calm surety, like the gentle lapping of the seafoam onto the sand. He’d come close to this, so close, with Pepper — but it had never been like this.

Oddly, that was what compelled him. And if he ended up regretting it… well. Screw it. He’d rather regret an active decision than a passive one.

He brought one hand up to rest on Rhodey’s shoulder, thumb grazing his neck. And then — before he could think better of it — he leant forward and kissed him.

He didn’t pull away, which was Tony’s greatest fear in that moment. Nor did he kiss pityingly or lustfully or uncertainly. No. He kissed gently, like he wanted to get it right, and firmly, like he had no doubts.

Tony Stark had a fair amount of experience when it came to that sort of thing, so he figured that he was qualified to judge whether or not a kiss was decent. And this kiss was pretty decent. Not mind-blowing, for sure, but it had that comfortable, relaxed feeling that Tony always, secretly, craved. 

_Anyway, stop overthinking it, idiot,_ he scolded himself. _Just enjoy it._

It was too late, though. The moment was slipping away from him, Rhodey was pulling away.

Tony’s eyes had, at some point, closed themselves. He opened them again, with some trepidation, trying to gauge Rhodey’s reaction. He scanned his face, relieved to find no trace of revulsion or disgust. But that wasn’t quite enough to totally allay his concerns.

When Tony didn’t speak, Rhodey took the initiative. “Been wanting to do that for a long time,” he admitted. “Since college, basically.”

Well. He hadn’t expected _that_.

“I-” Tony Stark was rarely speechless, but that was how he found himself. “What?”

“Yeah.” Rhodey’s cheeks warmed a little, though Tony couldn’t see it in the darkness.

“You could have told me sooner!”

“Where’s the fun in that?”

“I - damn you, Rhodes!”

He subsided into a mildly incensed silence, emotion more directed at his own obliviousness than anything else. For once, he struggled to hold on to any negativity in the face of the warmth that had seeped through him, and it dissolved completely when Rhodey threaded one hand into his hair.

“Found more confetti,” Rhodey commented with a smile, pulling the piece of tissue paper from Tony’s hair.

He rolled his eyes. “Ugh, I hate that stuff. Technically, it’s a confetto, though.”

“What?”

“One piece of confetti is a confetto.”

“Of course. I should have known,” he responded dryly, his usual response to Tony’s pointless corrections.

“Anyway, more champagne?” Tony offered. “We might as well finish the bottle.”

Anything to prolong the moment, now that they’d finally gotten there. Tony had no intention of allowing it to evaporate.

**Author's Note:**

> If I remember correctly, Avengers was released in April 2012, with Iron Man 3 in April 2013. That places this in December 2012/January 2013.


End file.
